


ballads of camelot

by dreadfulbeauties



Series: fandom music box ficlets [1]
Category: Arthurian Mythology
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Multi, and everything in between, both in his life as well as how the narrative treats him, forewarning a lot of these are based on galahad, he is my darling wonderful imperfect sweetheart, that's because i love him, who deserves better
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-05
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:15:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 2,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27401065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dreadfulbeauties/pseuds/dreadfulbeauties
Summary: In which your local fanfic writer uploads 100 itty-bitty, mini cupcake-sized drabbles for everyone's favorite knights in not-so shinning armor based off whatever song she's listening to at the time. Some fluffy, some angsty, all Arthuriana.
Relationships: Arthur Pendragon & Mordred (Arthurian), Galahad/Percival (Arthurian), Lancelot du Lac/Dinadan (Arthurian)
Series: fandom music box ficlets [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2001772
Comments: 2
Kudos: 15





	1. the end of paradox

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> warning(s): referenced character death.

The cool edges of a sunset. Sticky wine. Violet, violet, violet.

That is — was — Galahad’s favorite color. Percival knows this well. He knows it from the times he gave him lilacs and irises and Galahad smiled, so radiant, telling him he loved the flowers though he loved Percival more. Violet is bold but soothing on the eyes, it’s a reminder of the splash of color that new life in spring brings. It is the color of royalty, but it does not solely belong to the royals.

Percival likes blue — soft blue, of summe skies and peaceful ocean waters — but he has to admit violet is lovely.

While the memory of Galahad at his side fades, violet remains strong. He remembers soft, warm dark brown eyes and a faintly bright smile. There was blood crusting his hands at the end of the Grail Quest, Galahad’s blood, but he can’t remember it particularly well. It’s as though his mind wants him to forget about Galahad because the clarity of the good they found in one another hurts more than any other wound Percival will know.

He watches the sunset now. There is orange, pink, gold, white, blue fading soft upon the horizon — and then the violet.

Wind whistles. Percival remembers.

_I wish you were still here._

Violet bleeds into the sky.

_I miss you._

Clouds grow faint.

_I’m sorry. I wish I’d gotten there in time and you were still here._

There come the first stars, pinpricks on the horizon.

_I know it’s selfish, but why couldn’t it have just been us? God surely loved us both enough to not want to separate us, didn’t he?_

He can’t cry. His tears are all spent, crying is a luxury he hardly deserves.

_I wish you didn’t have to die._

Violet melts into indigo which melts into black, bold and dark upon the foreground of shimmering stars. Surely a color isn’t enough, but it’s what Percival has after Galahad is gone.


	2. the sea where one's home planet reflects

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> warning(s): n/a

Arthur knows he is not a perfect man, but he can at least try to be good.

He does love Mordred. It hurts, knowing what Morgause did to him, but Mordred is here and does not deserve to be at the centerpiece of destiny, the rotating hands of a compass that will always point north. So he is a father. The sins of the parent should never be the sins of the child, he thinks, so he claims Mordred as his own. Mordred will grow up and inherit the kingdom, even if everyone around him says that his bastard son doesn’t deserve it.

They don’t say anything on those nights spent near the lake. He’s so young — nine? ten? — round little face hidden against Arthur’s cloak, white hair pale and ghost-like against the dark shadows. They always do this every full moon, just the two of them and nobody else. Father and son. They are perfectly imperfect.

“Can you tell me which star is the brightest?” This is a routine for them, one that they have practiced hundreds of times.

Mordred peeks out and points up to one flickering, bold little spot of light in the distance. “Sirius. That one.”

“Can you tell me which one is the North Star?”

“Polaris. That one.” He reaches up towards the faintly yellow dot and for a moment Arthur thinks that Mordred might cup the North Star in his tiny hand and close his fist, bringing it back down to Earth. It’s his son, after all.

“Why is Polaris so special?”

“Because it’ll stay in place for a very, very long time. Even if the other stars move, Polaris won’t.”

(There was one night when Mordred said through sleepy mumbles that he wondered if he came from the moon. Arthur laughed a little, and they looked for a while at the moon’s reflection shimmering light and distorted upon the clear, ink-black waters of the lake. Moon or no moon, Mordred doesn’t deserve to be seen the way he is. He hopes that his son will grow up knowing that, and knowing that he deserves better, that he can take two skips off the earth’s surface and float towards the moon if he so wishes.)

“I’ll try to be like Polaris for you.” Arthur pulls him close.

“What do you mean?”

“I’ll be here for you if you ever need me. Things change growing up — I know, I grew up too quickly myself. But you can always look back to me if you need to find your way.”

They sit quiet, Mordred wrapped up in Arthur’s arms until at long last, his eyelids slide shut and he falls asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...yes, another touhou song. don't give me that look, i love me some touhou.
> 
> i listened to the music box rendition of this song, actually! and i mean... i gueeeesss this is significantly more fluffy and sweet than the last piece? then it becomes sad when you remember what happens to poor arthur and mordred.


	3. confessio

This is the real Galahad, who’s lifted up the skin above his ribcage to extract his heart for Percival to see. He lies next to him in the bed and breathes soft and voiceless. No more facades, no more armor. Here they can be themselves. They are their own confessions.

Percival has lost count of how many frosty early mornings they have spent like this one. But he treasures them all, treasures waking up next to Galahad to see his still sleeping face, long and pale red-gold hair trailing across the pillow’s plush surface. He can pretend. He can close his eyes and pretend that they will not have to rise.

“Good morning,” he says softly. He loops a strand of Galahad’s hair around one finger.

“I…” Galahad blinks, soft brown eyes twitching open and shut. Percival loves Galahad’s eyes: Deep, dark brown and so very clear. He moves closer to Percival so that he is properly nestled in his arms, sheets sliding over his body as he moves.

“I love you.”

There it is. The first. Not drowned out by the church bells ringing in the distance, nor being uncomfortably trapped between tongue and teeth. Though Percival knows there is no need to say such words, he is nevertheless glad he gets to hear them. So, even knowing that they have expressed such love through handwritten notes slipped to one another and evenings spent cradled in one another’s arms away from prying eyes, Percival responds. They both need to hear this — perhaps not more than anything like a hyperbolic might say, but something to be heard, all the same.

“I love you too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: i managed to type this when i was really tired and my eyes were closed, guess who didn't fall asleep in the middle of writing.
> 
> still hyperfixating on my days of weeb music, though, as you can tell by the title being a blatant referral to the song of the same name in the madoka magica anime


	4. honey i'm home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> warning(s): referenced semi-graphic child abuse.

Bruises lining skin and aching even on the soft bedsheets. He’s scared. He’s scared he’s scared he’s scared. He heard the hiss of the burning poker glowing orange and turned away. He didn’t want that. Gareth tries to be good, but he’s the runt. He knows how Mother stumbles — she was made weak by him, that’s what Agravaine tells him. Agravaine who is so much fairer, whose face is his only fortune who cries even when Mother hits him too hard, too. It hurts. It hurts. It hurts. Gareth is trying to be goo. He knows Mother is, too — he loves Mother. And she takes him in his arms and cries afterwards about how sorry she is for hurting him the way she did, she smells of patchouli, he thinks. He’s never ben very good with perfumes, never been very good with anything. In the end, he’s just not sure. He loves Mother. He loves her so much. He wishes that he could eat again, that she didn’t withhold food from him. He can count his ribs beneath shrunken, pale, skin. He thinks his hair’s starting to fall out — is he growing old already? He’s only twelve. Again, Gareth is scared. Pathetic. Nothing. Just praying to some God out there who won’t answer him, and maybe that’s because all of this is right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...had some kind of anxiety-induced breakdown typing this one up and it sure reads like it! :]
> 
> since i hate vagueposting, i'll provide the context about said breakdown: i've dealt with quite a bit of stress in my real life this past week - strained moments between my family and i, school and college-related struggles, not to mention fraught situations with people online. i wrote this sort of... stream of consciousness work? listening to the piano version of ghost's "honey i'm home" which is a vent song of sorts. i guess i wanted some space to be negative.
> 
> thank you all for reading. please take care of yourselves and stay safe.


	5. the forest of grief

_My my,_ the cicadas seem to titter in the distant woods, _You think you can run off to hide in these woods?_

Galahad’s a coward. He knows this much. He is a coward for putting up a front around other people. They hardly know that beneath the gentle smile he decorates his face with that he is nothing. He isn’t worthy of the pedestal he is put on. He hates who he is and hates what he reminds his father of.

He started taking long walks — for exercise, he’d told the other knights. But as each day passes, he strays deeper and deeper into the woods. Some days Galahad wonders what might happen if he simply turns away from the rest of the world and runs through the foliage concealing the sky, never to look back. Wouldn’t it be nice? To live as one amongst the creatures that lurk in the night as Percival once did? To live, perhaps, like the satyrs and dryads of old?

But he can’t. People would come looking for him. And it would be a selfish, selfish and foolish thing of him to run off. He has to keep going. He has to keep his chin up even though the burden of having to take another step forward with each day that passes _guts_ him. We love you, say the people of Camelot, but do they love Galahad the knight or Galahad the boy?

He’s selfish. Selfish selfish selfish selfish. Selfish for even thinking of things like these when he ought to worry more about Percival.

But he stays in the woods until the air begins to grow cold and the cicadas grow louder. He thinks if he looks hard enough he might find some small brightness in the woods he can hoarde to himself. But he knows he won’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am feeling considerably better since my last drabble for this fic. unfortunately, listening to the titular song (the more common title in the og japanese is "nageki no mori") i am reminded of how sad the vn/manga that said song came from actually is :]
> 
> in other words, expect some higurashi fanfiction in between my uploads for this.


	6. memory (all alone)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> warning(s): referenced sexual assault - nothing graphic.

I like you.

We’re very young when we first meet — barely taking our first steps into adulthood. I think you resent me at first because I love jokes. Jokes are there to take your mind off things, to turn your attention away from what’s eating away at everyone else. But I think you eventually grow to almost respect me. I think. I don’t know for certain. But you snort at my pranks and crack a smile when you think I’m not looking, instead of rolling your eyes and grumbling that I’m not funny. You have a lovely smile.

I like you.

You return home from that quest crying. Your armor’s all rusted and you stumble off your horse. There’s Arthur, wringing his hands in the dark and asking what’s wrong. But the fear in his eyes — the fear in the eyes of my king, my leader, the man supposed to be in charge of it all — speaks of familiarity. As though he might have gone through something like you did. You don’t say a thing about it it. Except to me. I watch the snot bubbling to a crust on your face as you choke on about the girl. I’ve never come so close to hating someone.

I like you.

You’re different after that. When we’re alone you don’t ask me to stop when I lean in to kiss you. That scares me. I pull back and you just say that the girl never bothered to stop. You don’t think anyone else will, then. I will. I will. I will stop for everyone and anyone, but you especially. What happened to you wasn’t right, wasn’t _fair,_ I hate how that girl with her putridly innocent smile hurt you the way she did, made you think worse on yourself and have you be a stranger in your own body.

I like you.

We go on. You stay many nights with me, counting the freckles on my arms as though they are stars in the sky you want to memorize the names of. Every night I ask if you will stay and I hope you will say yes. You do, but you never actually say. You just tell me what I want to hear. I wish that you recognized the way I feel about you. Except you do. And I think you feel the same way, but you’re so retracted into the belief that you must devote yourself to your queen first and then whoever else asks anything of you that you don’t want me. At least that’s what you explain to me.

I like you.

Those were our days. You’ve got me in your arms as it storms above, raindrops bleeding through my armor. Breathing hurts. I said too many of the wrong words and deserved to die for a false king. You’re here, I’m here, and we’re all too late.

I liked you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...lancelot/dinadan is such an underrated couple. :(


	7. in iolite

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i listened to the english version w/ vocals by prinz. it's a very eerie but relaxing song.

He removes his cloak and hangs it on the peg — he intends to stay the night, Arthur knows. “He”. Not Lancelot. This is not Lancelot, it is someone else wearing his skin with words he’d like to say trapped between his tongue and teeth. This thing has Lancelot’s blue that are blue but so very, very empty (not like Lance. Not like Lance at all).

“You’re here again,” he says.

Lancelot (alright, it is Lancelot, Arthur, you have to stop being so foolish, reaching for fistfuls of naivete and clinging onto the past when there is something wrong) smiles. It is fragile, as though if Arthur were to press his hand against his face too hard cracks would appear.

“How did the quest fare?”

“It went well.”

It’s as though cobwebs have been stuffed down his throat and coat the inside of his mouth with the way he talks. Creaky. Flat. But unsteady, something’s ready to break. Arthur grows fearful knowing that much.

“You don’t seem well. Is everything alright?”

“I’m fine, I’m fine. You worry too much. Wart.”

_See?_ Lancelot pleads silently. _See? I’m well enough to use your old nickname, the one you told me about when we first met. Were I unhappy I wouldn’t use it. Please believe that I am okay, please uphold the truth you want us both to believe._

“Lance, I—”

“Aren’t you going to do anything with me tonight?”

Arthur falls mute.

“That’s what’s gone on with all the other knights and ladies when they ask of me to. Ever since Elaine. She didn’t ask, even when I told her I didn’t want it, never wanted it. And I’ve been so scared since then. I know how those around me see me, and I wondered what might happen if I said no. What then?”

Arthur clenches his fist. He leans over towards Lancelot, staring him directly into his eyes. He has abandoned all pretense of cheer, face creased with worry. It is only in front of Arthur that he lays himself bare, but it isn’t for the reasons Arthur hoped it would be. They are friends, they are friends, they are friends — if Lancelot really wanted him it shouldn’t have been because he thought he was less than an equal to Arthur. Not because he thinks he is a toy or harlot.

_Remember when we were young and thought that the world could be nothing but sweet and fair, and that kindness and goodness would conquer all? Just as a part of a neverending battle? We forced ourselves to keep going because we were too stupid to think otherwise. We flew colored kites, chased through thousands upon thousands of yesterdays._

“I won’t. I wouldn’t. You trust me, don’t you? We’ve been friends for years, Lance. If you wanted me to cease, I would.”

“Let’s get out of here. Why don’t we run far away from this place?”

“You know we can’t. I am king, you are a knight, we have a country to oversee—”

“Or at least I wish we could. Just run as far away as we can and not turn back. I’m scared of the monotony in the years that will follow, especially now that I know I’m nothing. But that’s never going to happen.”

They don’t speak much that night. They don’t have much to say after that. If Arthur told him things would be alright, he’d be lying, and he despises lying.

_I can’t say it, but I wish we could just get out of here, too._


	8. entreat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> warning(s): slight gore.

The ending to this story is not a happy one.

Gaheris knew that from the beginning. He’s the forgotten one, fading in the background next to his brothers. He’s content with that. He is here to support his brothers. He is the third youngest, not quite looked after and not quite the one looking after. 

He forces himself to keep his crying stuck in his chest, not to talk too much. It’s okay for his brothers to cry. Not him, though. That is a luxury he does not deserve. Not after the months of being denied food by his own mother till the hunger gnaws painfully at him through his stomach, not through the burning pain.

Suppose, he thinks, the Knights of the Round Table are angels. He was given wings when he recieved his position as a knight. When he decided to pursue his own mother, let the thin edge of his blade make muscle tear and bone crack, he ripped his own wings off. He did it for his brothers. He couldn’t take it. He did not want to have to return there ever again — Agravaine and Mordred accompanied him. 

He’s carried his family’s pains on his back. He doesn’t care if he loses everything or is doomed to be forgotten.

So when he dies at Camlann, spitting up blood as darkness clouds his vision, he prays that his brothers will return home to where he is again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ehhh... this one doesn't entirely make sense? i was just listening to ange ushiromiya's image song - "entreat" - and getting gaheris feels.

**Author's Note:**

> the title is from secret messenger's beautiful and very heartbreaking remix of necrofantasia - i strongly urge you to go listen to it, just type "the end of paradox" on youtube and it should pop up. the chanting at the end gave me chills and i choked up.


End file.
